Aha. No wonder I was having trouble finding Al on Russian sites with my guess at transliteration. "Странный Эл" Янкович it is then. Спасибо большое!!

But I did truly enjoy the video:
-- Your refrain "CHO! CHO! ... No, no, it's nothing, never mind ... CHO! CHO! Get over here! ... Please??" made me laugh out loud ...
-- How you tried to educate the hoods in the street with a DVD of all of Fellini's films [plus the "retrospective of Swedish film" you saw alone in the theatre] ...
-- I caught several St. Petersburg references, such as your comment that Moscow has the Kremlin and Peter has the Hermitage.
-- I also like to how at the end you said -- correct me if I'm wrong -- "Oh! A seminar! I'm hungry!!"

I couldn't figure out which language you said your parakeet speaks, though ...

And your accordion playing!! Ocean horrorshow! [Only Seva will get that ...]

Yeah, and you even apologized that you didn't stop around my house and didn't say "Hi!" - Though the whole event was 6 years before my actual birth. Yes, I DO remember that!! Ah, those early days of my WOWAY beginnings...

OCEAN HORRORSHOW!!! You never fail to crack me up!

And you're the only person who GOT and LAUGHED with at least SOME OF the references! That's super cool.

BTW, the Swedish film I'm watching alone in the cinema theatre is Ingmar Bergman's Seventh Seal (you can actually hear me shouting "Bergman!" at the end of a sentence), which is still considered by many to be his masterpiece.

And, the whole video is actually based on St. Petersburg-only references. In fact, some entitled it as "St. Petersburg's cultural answer to Rapper Syava".

"Да ладно" is also an interesting expression. It contains "да" (yes) and ладно - an old Russian word for the adverb "good". When used together, it means something like "can't believe it!" or "WOW, really?!".

And yes, my parakeet (thanks for the word BTW, never heard that before) speaks по-валлийски - Welsh. You can also hear a red parrot poppin' at the right corner and screamin' "WELSH!!!" at the end of a sentence.

Heh heh ... and you know of course that is what the Russian moviegoer said when he was asked what he thought of the movie "Jaws" ...

[To let everyone else in on the joke, the Russian expression for "Very good!" is written "Очень хорошо!" and pronounced "O-chen hkho-ro-sho", which Anglos say sounds a lot like "Ocean horrorshow".]

Seva @ March 16, 2009 04:55 pm wrote:BTW, the Swedish film I'm watching alone in the cinema theatre is Ingmar Bergman's Seventh Seal (you can actually hear me shouting "Bergman!" at the end of a sentence), which is still considered by many to be his masterpiece.

Конечно! I recognized Bergman's classic immediately. And now that you point it out, I relistened and could hear the "Bergman!" line now. But I also clearly heard your line about the retrospective of Swedish film as well.

Seva @ March 16, 2009 04:55 pm wrote:"Да ладно" is also an interesting expression. It contains "да" (yes) and ладно - an old Russian word for the adverb "good". When used together, it means something like "can't believe it!" or "WOW, really?!".

Ahhh ... I thought you were saying "Голодно" [which sounds a lot like "Да ладно"] which of course you know means "Hungrily". I thought maybe you were hungry for ... knowledge or ... something ... like ... that ...

Seva @ March 16, 2009 04:55 pm wrote:And yes, my parakeet (thanks for the word BTW, never heard that before) speaks по-валлийски - Welsh. You can also hear a red parrot poppin' at the right corner and screamin' "WELSH!!!" at the end of a sentence.

Okay ... "Valleeskee" ... so that's Welsh. Should have thought of that. Couldn't think of any languages beginning with a V besides Vietnamese ... Not a language I'd expect to run across frequently in Russia either to be sure ... LOL ...

Seva, I just watched your video and I loved it! I wish there were subtitles so I could understand the words, but I did see some things- (26+1) that were familiar. And your accordion playing is amazing!

...man is distinguished from all other creatures by the faculty of laughter.
-Joseph Addison

jerAL @ March 25, 2009 01:52 am wrote: Seva, I just watched your video and I loved it! I wish there were subtitles so I could understand the words, but I did see some things- (26+1) that were familiar. And your accordion playing is amazing!

Thanks! BTW, the 26+1 thing wasn't on purpose - The DVD was made by our cameraman (not a die-hard fan of Al), who just checked in the Internet and counted that Fellini had 26 films. So, the DVD is - All Fellini movies, 26 in 1...

BTW, there's another great news. Tomorrow, our rock parody band will perform as the opening act for the original artist I parodied. Cool, huh? Though I hope there won't be any thugs among the viewers - his audience could be "edgier" than mine... Hope they don't throw too much underwear, too...

The concert, according to my friends who attended it, was absolutely epic and historical. Though I sure can't call it positive or cheery...

Though I hope there won't be any thugs among the viewers - his audience could be "edgier" than mine...

That was exactly what I was aware of. Part of the Syava's audience (who was extremely nice and humorous guy) were those thugs who didn't get the joke and came to the show to see their "mentor" drinking beer onstage and rapping obscenities. Our performance was the first one, and when we came onstage, they started screaming: Go to HELL!! I started to talk with them in a jokingly way so they even laughed with the rest of the audience, though were obviously too much stoned and drunk to recognize what I'm saying. We played our short set and invited Syava, the original artist I parodied, on stage. He and his "thug" band were very funny, rapping and chatting with the audience - in an obscene way, of course, but it was cool nevertheless. And then, the mess started. The very drunk guy, about 200 cm high and very tough-looking, crawled on stage to dance. The security wanted to stop him, so they started to fight. Skipping all the "colorful" descriptions, I'd say that it all ended with the police and ambulance, with the guy lying onstage, his head bleeding, his mouth whispering curses and loathe. The band interrupted a concert, apologized and left the stage. The concert spiralled downward...

And what about us? Well. we were behind the stage and... we laughed a lot. We laughed hysterically at the TOUGHEST concert we took part in. And yes, the guys' alive, thank God.

Hope they don't throw too much underwear, too...

I meant it as a joke, but that guy who finally landed at the band's feet bleeding wore nothing on himself but a pair of short undies. Never say never!